Paradigm Shift
by Suilven
Summary: He was her friend, her brother in arms. So, how did everything suddenly become so different? And, more importantly, why did he have to be so bloody annoying about it?


**Paradigm Shift**

The Deep Roads were cold and dark, stone and misery, with water from an unknown source dripping down the walls to collect in stagnant pools in the dips and hollows of the rock beneath their feet. As much as she tried to avoid them, stepping in them was inevitable; the faintly phosphorescent murk seeping in through the holes in her boots. Her socks were wet and clammy, the dampness gradually wicking up her calf as they walked. Even Oghren seemed ill at ease now, glancing behind them into the long tunnels of shadowy darkness too many times for her not to notice. Lyna shivered, pulling her threadbare cloak more securely around her shoulders. There had been no darkspawn for the past few hours and her fingers leapt to her swords every time Alistair twitched. He could sense them from further away than she could, but there was simply nothing to sense. They weren't here.

They made camp at the first opportunity, none of them speaking as they each set up their tents in the gloom of the few torches they allowed themselves. There would be no fire again—nothing to burn, too risky—and that meant another meal of dried meat with a tiny bit of their rationed bread and cheese. She would have wept for an apple. Anything growing. Some fragment of life to refresh her in this horrible place.

Her bedroll had never looked more inviting—and blissfully dry—and Lyna curled up in it with a sigh. The grumbling of her stomach was difficult, but not impossible, to ignore for the time being. She should be out there, _leading_, doing whatever it was she was supposed to be doing, but she was finding it harder and harder to bring herself to care. Through the walls of her tent, she could see the faint glow from the torches and, if she closed her eyes tightly enough, she could almost pretend that the voices on the other side were speaking Dalish rather than the common tongue. The homesickness that had abated over the past eight months came rushing back with an ache that throbbed like an abscessed tooth. Her clan were all still there, living the life that _she_ was supposed to be living, while she was stuck here; a halla stabled with the horses.

"Lyna? Are you all right?" Alistair's voice just outside her tent startled her. She hadn't even heard him approach, and he was about as quiet as one of those bronto creatures.

"I'm fine." The words came out a little tighter than normal, unshed tears making her throat constrict.

"Are you sure? I have your ration of food." Her traitorous stomach gave a rumbled roar of protest at her initial plan to just skip dinner. "Are you coming out or, uh—" Lyna could actually _hear_ him blushing. "—should I, um, come in?"

She didn't want to go out there. In here, she could imagine whatever she wanted; there were stars overhead, trees all around, wind, rain… She just couldn't face the weight of the rock staring back at her. "You can come in." Lyna sat up, the blankets still tucked around her legs, as Alistair lifted the flap and hesitated at the entrance, his uncertainty etched on his face. It was darker inside the tent than outside, where the torches still flickered weakly.

At last, he crawled in, and the interior of the tent fell into nearly full darkness once more. "I, uh, can't see a thing."

"Ow! That's my hand you're crushing!" At least he wasn't wearing his armor.

"Sorry!" He settled down next to her, still a respectably safe distance apart. His presence was comforting, familiar now, though it hadn't been an easy thing between them. Every inch forward had been a struggle, one that she was beginning to grow weary of.

She was never going home.

She was a blasted Grey Warden, no matter what _she_ had wanted, and this bumbling _shem_ had somehow become the closest thing she had to a friend.

"This is both of our portions." He passed her a bundle of cloth—well, technically he passed it to her shoulder… how tall did he think she was, anyway?— and she set it down between them before folding back the edges. She grabbed two strips of dried meat, handing one to him and gnawing on one herself.

"So, where do you think the darkspawn are? Can you sense anything?" The herbs that had been used to flavor the meat as it cured were making her tongue burn with spice, and she hoped Alistair had had the common sense to bring a waterskin, yet another precious commodity down here.

"I don't know." He reached for another strip of meat. "I don't sense anything here. This whole section seems to be deserted for some reason."

_How had he finished his first one so quickly? Had he swallowed it whole?_

"Is that a good thing or a bad thing?" She'd found the waterskin and now it was an effort not to gulp. The last water they'd found that was even remotely drinkable was two days behind them, and now they were probably going to have to backtrack through the areas they'd slogged through today, since they had clearly lost Branka's path.

"I wish I knew."

They ate the rest of their meal in relative silence, Oghren's boisterous singing in the distance clearly indicating that he somehow had managed to secrete yet another bottle of spirits somewhere. She was nowhere near full, but her stomach was no longer screaming, so it would have to be enough. "Which watch do you want tonight?"

"Oghren has first watch, in the hopes that he might be sober enough to actually, you know, _watch_."

Lyna stifled a snort. "Not likely, but okay."

"Leliana volunteered for second and third; said she can't sleep here anyway."

"Glad to know I'm not the only one."

"I'm on fourth. You have a much needed night off."

"What?" She grabbed him by the collar and pulled him closer. "I don't need your stupid coddling, Alistair!"

"It's not coddling! You were practically asleep on your feet today. How many times did you trip and fall? Three? Four? I've never even seen you so much as stumble before."

"It was three and it wasn't stumbling. It's because my feet had gone numb from those puddles."

He pried her fingers away from his shirt. "I'm trying to be nice. You should try it sometime."

"I _am_ nice. I let you eat my ration of cheese, too. You just didn't notice because you inhaled everything. I'm surprised you didn't eat the cloth."

"Oh, now that's low."

"Maybe if I'd put some of that awful—what do you call it?—gravy on it?"

"That's it. You asked for it." Alistair yanked the blanket off her lap. "You have to, uh, forfeit your blanket. I'm going to be nice and warm tonight with _two_ blankets."

Lyna grabbed the portion still wrapped around her knees and pulled back. "Nice try."

He was stronger, but she was quicker, the tussle rapidly descending into the sort of play fighting she had once done with her brothers.

"Get off me!"

"You get off!"

"That's my hair, you cretin!"

"Sorry, did I hurt you? I didn't mean to—"

He released her and she pounced, pinning him on his back as she straddled his stomach. "I can't believe you fell for that!" Lyna attacked his sides as he tried to cringe away from her fingers. "Do you yield?"

He could barely speak from laughing. "Stop—tickling—I can't—breathe—Maker—fine—you asked—for it—"

Alistair rolled, no mean feat in the confines of the tent, reversing their positions so that his weight now pressed down on her and pinned her hands over her head. "You yield."

"No." She struggled against his grip uselessly. "Never."

"Yield. You know you want to…"

"Fine. I yield. Get off me."

"You have to ask _nicely_ first."

"You are such an ass." He laughed, and she could feel the warmth of his breath on her face.

It was suddenly as if the world had turned end over end like an hourglass. Her body was flush against his, each breath pushing them closer together. She stilled, sure he must be able to feel the way her heart was now beating erratically against his chest. This didn't feel like wrestling with her brothers any more. This felt like… something very different, and she realized with a start that this feeling had been quietly growing for more than a little while now. A ripple had become a current, now an undertow swirling her down beneath the water.

"Lyna?" he whispered. "Are you okay? I'm sorry…" He released her hands and moved to pull away, but she was faster. Her hands reached around the back of his head, tugging him down. "What are you… oh!"

She kissed him tentatively, a soft touch of lips asking for something more; a seemingly chaste kiss that lingered a little too long, although she broke it off quickly. She wished she could see his face, his eyes, during the moment of "now what?" that was blooming between them.

Alistair had gone completely still as well, until his thumb inexplicably traced over her cheek. "You just… you just kissed me. I thought you didn't—that you'd never… You kissed me!"

"I think you said that already." His thumb slid down her jaw, curving up to touch her lips. And then it wasn't his thumb, but his mouth on hers, a little deeper and hungrier than before. Her fingers curled into the hair at the nape of his neck; the nearness of him and the way his tongue was now exploring hers was making her feel almost intoxicated.

She wanted. There was no other way to describe it. She wanted him to keep going, wanted the ache of desire to grow stronger, wanted to touch him, taste him, claim him.

Alistair moved away from her mouth, kissing his way up her jaw to her ear. She was lost when he took her earlobe between his teeth, unable to stop the whimper that escaped her as he nibbled the pointed tip at the top. She almost didn't realize he was speaking, his voice husky and soft. "Do you yield?"

"No." Lyna reached down and stroked his very obvious arousal that was pressed into her thigh, her fingers rapidly extracting a long groan that rumbled through his chest. "Do you?"

His fingers found one of her nipples, twisting it gently until she arched against him. "We appear to be at an impasse then."

"Hmmm… what do you suggest?" He was grinding helplessly against her hand and the power of it was exhilarating.

"Sex?"

A sputtering choke was her answer. "Maker, Lyna, I _want_ to, that's, um, pretty obvious I think. But, I don't know if I'm ready for that, uh, right now."

"You seem pretty ready to me." Her hands elicited another groan.

"All right. I concede that point." His breathing was a little ragged now as she leaned over to kiss the base of his throat, letting her teeth graze over the skin gently. "I just don't want to do this unless it means something—Maker, that's amazing—more than just, you know, a fling."

Lyna stopped and lifted her head. "You think I would have initiated this if you didn't mean anything to me?"

"Do I? Mean something to you? I always thought you would never see me as more than a brother and, for a long time, I didn't think we'd even get that far."

"Of course you mean something to me, you idiot! Is your _shem_ skull really that thick?"

"Maybe I want to hear you say it."

She sighed in mock exasperation. "Fine. I'm madly in love with you. Can we have sex now?"

Alistair kissed the tip of her nose. "You're really bad at asking nicely. And, I don't believe you."

Lyna growled. "You think too much. You talk too much. Have you ever tried just listening to what your body is telling you for once? I want you. You want me. I'm hardly some casual fling because, in case you missed it, we're stuck together, at least until the Archdemon eats us. And then I suppose we'll still be together, just in chewed up form." She shoved him off her, sitting up angrily. "If that's not good enough for you, then I don't know what more you want me to do."

"Now who's talking too much?"

With a scream of frustration she launched herself at him again, each word punctuated by her finger jabbing into his chest. "You make me crazy."

"I'm in love with you."

"What?"

"I'm in love with you."

It was her turn to sputter. "But… I'm an elf—"

"Don't care."

"—and you're a human—"

"Don't care."

"—who's practically the bloody king—"

"Don't care."

"—and we can't agree on anything—"

"We seem to agree on this."

"We do?"

He fumbled around to find her hand and squeezed it. "Well, we were…"

"I seem to vaguely recall that the cessation of those activities was _your_ fault, not mine."

Alistair sighed, imitating her. "Fine. I'm sorry. Can we have sex now?"

"Ask nicely. And say it without blushing."

"How do you know I'm blushing?"

Lyna rolled her eyes. "Because I know you too well, sadly."

"Do you love me?" His voice was quiet, all traces of teasing suddenly conspicuously absent.

She bit back her glib response and thought for a moment. "I don't know. You make me laugh. When I'm with you, I feel like I belong here. Not the same as with my clan, but not so… lost. When you kissed me, I wanted you, more than I ever wanted any of the others I've bonded with. You… mean a lot to me." She swallowed, looking down at her lap. "If that's not enough, then you should go and we'll just pretend none of this ever happened." Why was the thought of him leaving making her feel as though a chasm had opened up at her feet?

His hand cupped her chin and he kissed her tenderly. "That's all I wanted to know. Was that so hard?"

"No, but I promise to make you that way."

"Okay, now I'm blushing."

"More dirty talk. Got it."

"You're impossible."

"Shut up and kiss me. You talk too much."

He obliged and, for the next few hours, it no longer mattered quite so much that they were in the middle of the wretched Deep Roads, that her life had changed in a way she'd never expected, and that they were expected to magically save the whole bloody world.

It was just the two of them and, for those precious hours, it was more than enough.

* * *

><p><em>AN: For the lovely Merilsell, because I can't write a female Dalish elf without thinking of Lenya. :) Thank you so very, very much to Josie Lange for the super speedy beta read (I appreciate you so much, you know!)._


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